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Had a short play with a VPL11 this weekend. Obviously dont have a VPL10 to compare with. Seems like its slightly quieter. Black levels may be slightly blacker but I cant say its a big difference. My main area of interest was whether the de-interlacing had got better and how good their implementation of 2:3 pulldown is.

First disc I played suffered badly from jaggies. Looked to me like no 2:3 pulldown was happening. Turns out it had been supplied by distributor set with DRCx4 not at prog setting. I didnt get an instruction manual with it so I am guessing that my method to fix this was correct. Once prog was set to on things got better. As my Insurrection disc has disappeared I used Gladiator. It was at that point the best fixed panel playback of this scene Ive seen. Still suffered from bad jaggies on wooden sills in front of emperor and his sister and on front leading edge of seating areas in arena but it was much more stable than VPL10 ever was. Adding an Arcam FMJ27, DVD2800, Skyworth should improve this. This unit still lacks the punch you get with other devices like the HT200DM from SIM2. It does exhibit far fewer artefacts though. This punch comes from contrast and colour accuracy I believe.

It does still seem to have primary colours which arent red or green enough. So heavily saturated areas of these colours look sort of washed out. VPL10 was like this too.

Havent had time to do greyscale so cant say how accurate it is compared to VPL10. Standard factory temperatures are basically blue or green ..not very accurate looking to me ..but then none of these are particularly close except perhaps the SIM2s again. Quick mucking around got it closer to my liking.

So to sum up its better than a 10 but not hugely to my eyes. Good value for money though!

Standard Member

Thanks for both reviews I had my 10ht now for 3 months and couldn't be any happier..yes I know its limits but at the run out sale price it was a steal!! love to have a sharp 9000 but my 10ht allowed me to get the denon 3802 & 2800 + screen and heaps left for dvd's for me it was a cheap way into ht...
cheers laurie

Guest

Exactly some people don't want to spend a fortune on their mini cinema at home, just means more money to spend on flashier cars .

I was quite surprised how little improvement the Infocus DLP 350 projector gave in picture quality, in fact I much prefered my cheap Sony projector in many ways.

I think projectors / home cinema will change over the next year and become a lot cheaper so I think its best to spend a little and enjoy what you have and then wait and see what killer projector comes over the horizon!

Active Member

Originally posted by jrwood
I think projectors / home cinema will change over the next year and become a lot cheaper so I think its best to spend a little and enjoy what you have and then wait and see what killer projector comes over the horizon!

James

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There will always be a killer projector on the horizon! I think DLP will finally mature in the next 18 months or so to the point where it will easily match CRT. CRT will rapidly die-off thereafter as a home cinema format given that a 10lb shoebox sized unit will produce similar quality at a lower price. LCD will slowly disappear but will probably dominate the lower end of the market due to low cost (compared to DLP).

Hi-Def DVD will produce a new wave of matching Hi-Def DLP units which is what we will all be discussing in three years time! Its amazing how manufacturers manage to continue to produce things to take as much money away from you as they can! Start saving now!
Regards,
Paul

Active Member

I think DLP will finally mature in the next 18 months or so to the point where it will easily match CRT. CRT will rapidly die-off thereafter as a home cinema format given that a 10lb shoebox sized unit will produce similar quality at a lower price. LCD will slowly disappear but will probably dominate the lower end of the market due to low cost (compared to DLP).

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Rest of the industry says 3 years. and I don't think you will find it is DLP that will take the lead but reflective LCD (LCOS)

Don't lose sight of the fact that none of the DLP and some LCD have done enough hours to show their optical stability yet. there are optical filters (UV, IR, polarising and contrast enhancing) in these units which have not had the test of time. check your warenty but most are classed as consumables like lamps. It is not uncomon for these to need changing every couple of lamps.

Most manufactuers now use a sealed pannel or chip device. If an LCD pannel fails it is all three that have to be changed. Including all the dichroic mirrors. If the DLP chip fails it will have to be the whole engine usually spining wheel and every thing. This is fine under warrenty but has any one thought of the costs when these run out.

Roland Brooks
It'll be all right in the end. If it's not all right, it's not the end

Guest

I think this applies to most projectors anyway. At least I have peace of mind with a new projector imho and at the rate we're using it at 10 hours a week on average the projector will last 2 years after which projectors will be even cheaper and far better quality. I think a grand for that much use and quality is very cheap.

Out of interest if I bought a CRT projector and something went wrong with it whats the typical cost of it being repaired?, is it cheap then?.

Guest

I just phoned Sony and I have peace of mind for 2 years. They said that in the first year the unit would be replaced with a refurbished one and NO dead pixels even if mine had it! hmm thats impressive. After the first year the unit would be covered by return to base on all parts.

I kept asking what happens if the 'motherboard' blew and he said the warranty covered it.

Another reason to buy Sony guys/gals!, I heard horror stories from some other non Sony projector owners...

James

p.s I have many tweaks I want to do to with hardware wise but after 2 years when I bin this baby! ready for my DLP WXGA projector I will tweak it like mad!. If only car insurance was as cheap as projectors!.

Guest

Well,
I wonder if some wideboy will start in home calibration of lcd and dlp?
Bet they wont have the gall to charge 300-500 squid like the crt setup mob!!!!!

But then it might not happen at all-cos lcd`s and dlp`s are soooo easy to set up..but I feel it coming..IF you really want your lcd/dlp setup correctly you need ISF and THX optimode and joe kanes last 3 years letters...and...a regular yearly tweak to check the lamps working at optimim..and the filters are o.k...

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Doug: I do in home calibrations of these devices. You'll be glad to know that it's cheaper than you imagine....

Everyone else, here's your solution for dead pixels on a Sony Projector. Try and make something fail so you can get a new one under warranty as it seems from the above post they won't guarantee no pixel defects on your first one but they will on your second.....eh....OK! My experience is actually contrary to this though.

Member

my 11ht has only 2 dead pixels and you need to be 2 feet away and you have to look close ,i some times think that all this talk of dead pixels might put alot of people of buying a lcd projector ,which is a shame because on the whole lcd picture is good ,and you must be looking for faults to find them ,also the blacks are not black bit .to me are there not alot more colours than black when you watch a film ,i would have thought good colours and bright pictures is a plus point for lcd and ease of use (like aim set and fire ) oooops and get a screen ,,,
this is just my opinion ,

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I have sold projectors happily with 20 odd de\d pixels and no-one has complained, not even me. I have also sent back units with one or two dead pixels that were unwatchable. Specifically one with two failed green pixels, one of which was in a position where it got lots of light from the lamp, illuminating it like a beacon. It was so bright you could see this green dot in light scenes. These are rare though.

Active Member

Looked to me like no 2:3 pulldown was happening. Turns out it had been supplied by distributor set with DRCx4 not at prog setting. I didnt get an instruction manual with it so I am guessing that my method to fix this was correct.

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Gordon,
I'm not sure if this is correct or not. Based on what the Marata Vision rep told me, it should be set to DRCx4 when watcing movies. He said that you would switch it to DRC Progressive if you have static text material coming in over a video input, ie the screens from DVD-Audio or Video output from a laptop.

Here is what the 11HT manual says about DRCx4 and DRC Progressive. Let me know what you make of the explanation.
____________________________DRC-MF
Smoothes out a large video image. DRC x 4: Doubles the number of the video signal scanning lines and the number of horizontal pixels, resulting in quadrupled image quality. DRC Progressive: Displays a clear line or charachters without line flickering.
___________________________
The DRC x 4 and Progressive are the two types of DRC-MF.

I only looked at the difference between "x4" and "Progressive" on a couple discs. I didn't notice much of a difference. But, I'll do a more rigorous test later. I'm waiting for my screen to arrive today, so I'm preparing the fixings on the ceiling now.

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OK W: I didn't have the isntructions only my eyes....Here's waht I see. With DRCset a x4 you will see obvious de-interlacing artefacts on Galdiator Battle of Carthage scene. They were all reminiscent of lack of 3:2 pulldown. Now I know this unit is supposed to have this facility. On changing to DRC Prog the vast majority of these went away. I'll update more when I visit a client who has just got one of these for Christmas (didn't get it from me)